British and Irish Sound Archives - Dublin

The provisional programme for BISA 2019 has been published, with details of the talks and visits on Friday 15th and Saturday 16th November, as well as the training sessions on Thursday 14th.

For advice on travel to BISA 2019 and accommodation, see www.bisa-web.org/bisa-2019-travel-and-accommodation

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2019

Dublin

BISA 2019 Travel and accommodation

webmanager — Tue, 10 Sep 2019 21:08:27 +0000

TRAVEL

Getting to and from the Airport

There is no train transportation to or from Dublin Airport.

Buses run to and from Dublin Airport and Dublin city centre every ten – twenty minutes.

There is one private coach service, Aircoach, that leaves from Terminals 1 and 2 and arrives at the city centre (O’Connell Street and Grafton Street), with a limited number of stops on the way. Normal duration is about 20 minutes, although allow more time at peak hours. Return tickets are between €11- €15.

See: https://www.aircoach.ie/

Dublin Bus also runs a limited-stop service, the Airlink or 747, that runs from the Airport Terminals to the city centre (Marlborough Street) and takes about 20 minutes. Return tickets are €12.

Dublin Bus also run two regular routes, the 16 and 41, that stop at / leave from O’Connell Street but with journeys taking about twice as long. Single tickets are €3.

See: https://www.dublinbus.ie/

There is a taxi rank outside both terminals. The taxi fare from the airport to the city centre is usually about €20, not including gratuity, although fares might be higher depending on destination.

Getting to the Chester Beatty Library

The Chester Beatty Library is situated within Dublin Castle, which is itself located in the centre of Dublin city.

See: https://chesterbeatty.ie/visit/location/

Getting to and from RTÉ / UCD

RTÉ and UCD are located 2km apart in the south Dublin suburbs and both can be reached on the 39A bus. The 39A terminates in UCD and passes RTÉ. The cash fare is €3.00 (cash only, pay on bus; alternatively you can buy a bus pass in the city centre).

See: https://www.dublinbus.ie/

Getting to the CMC and ITMA

The CMC is located right beside Dublin Castle, at 19 Fishamble Street. ITMA is also located in the city centre, at 73 Merrion Square, some 2 km from the CMC, or a 20 minute walk.

See: https://www.itma.ie/contact/visit

Map of BISA 2019 venues:

PLACES TO STAY

There’s a good choice generally at this time of year in Dublin, though prices can be high.

Here are five hotels, all within walking distance of the venue, offering reasonable value for money - i.e. €80-€120 per night on Thursday 14th, and €130-€150 per night on Friday 15th:

Hilton Express O'Connell Street: https://bit.ly/2KGv1Xg
Handel Hotel Temple Bar: https://bit.ly/2Kt4dL9
Jury's Inn Christchurch: https://www.jurysinns.com/hotels/dublin/christchurch
Maldron Hotel, Kevin Street: https://bit.ly/2Meu8bB
Maldron Hotel, Smithfield: https://www.maldronhotelsmithfield.com/

It is possible to get better rates by moving further away, especially by looking for B&B accommodation, although if you stay within walking distance of the centre these don’t seem exceptionally competitive. There's also Air B&B of course.

The Temple Bar district of the city centre is very close to the venue but is notorious for stag and hen parties and therefore can be noisy. The only hotel included that is located in this area is in a fairly quiet corner.

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2019

Dublin

RTÉ

BISA 2019 - presentations

webmanager — Mon, 02 Sep 2019 17:42:37 +0000

2019 British & Irish Sound Archives (BISA) annual conference

Abstracts and presentations:

Naomi Harvey, PhD researcher, Heriot-Watt University & National Library of Scotland: Exploring the impact of access to sound archives on traditional song practice in Scotland.

This paper will reflect on issues surrounding the accessibility of ethnological sound collections, and explore the effects that access to sound archives is having on traditional song practice in Scotland.

Taking as a backdrop the ‘Scotland’s Sounds’ network of sound collections, this presentation will describe outreach and engagement projects carried out within the network in recent years which have involved elements of traditional song, in both Scots and Gaelic. It will cover such diverse themes as: the ‘small-scale repatriation’ of songs from archival sources to the communities in which they originated; ideas around the creative re-use of archive recordings; and the role of the archivist in developing and delivering such projects. It will also draw together evidence gathered through fieldwork interviews with traditional singers about their experiences of using sound archives – both through these Scotland’s Sounds projects and also in their wider musical practice. These interviews explore singers’ range of methods and motivations for accessing archives; ideas about learning, performing and passing on songs learned from archive sources; and also positive and negative impressions of their archive experiences.

Through this two-sided exploration, the presentation will consider the impact that access to sound archives may be having on contemporary traditional song practices, but also, conversely, how understanding the experiences of this particular group of sound archive users could challenge or inform ideas in archival practices around access.

Donal McAnallen (National Museums NI), Katie Scaife (Bristol Culture), David Baldwin (London Metropolitan Archives): Engaging audiences with sound recordings - case studies from Unlocking Our Sound Heritage

In July 2017, a five year project commenced entitled Unlocking Our Sound Heritage. Led by the British Library and funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, the project aims to digitally preserve almost half a million endangered sound recordings and open them up to everyone. Ten partner organisations, or hubs, from across the UK are currently working together with the British Library on the project. This paper will examine some of the ways in which the hubs have started to use sounds preserved as part of the project with different audiences. In Northern Ireland, oral history recordings have been used to explore issues relating to culture and identity with a women’s group from Belfast who worked with a visual artist to produce a creative response to what they had heard. In London, sounds have been used to support people living with dementia, whilst in Bristol, pub-based engagement has been used as a way to increase the public’s awareness of sound, in particular jazz music. Volunteering is another way in which audiences are getting involved with the project. Up and down the country, volunteers have been helping to preserve and interpret a diverse range of sounds, increasing their understanding and appreciation of sound collections in the process. This paper will share some of their experiences to date, providing a personal perspective in relation to audiences' engagement with sound recordings.

Andy Linehan, Curator of Popular Music Collections, British Library: Let’s get digital – acquiring commercial releases for the British Library’s Popular Music collection

The British Library’s Sound Archive holds one of the largest collections of commercially-released recordings in the world. Over 250,000 LPs, 360,000 CDs and 200,000 shellac discs have been acquired over the last half century representing more than 100 years of music history. The BL’s historical practices have concentrated on the acquisition of physical items which were labelled, catalogued and put on shelves.

However the digital domain has brought about a reassessment of how to collect and represent popular music. Many commercial releases today are digital-only and have no physical manifestation yet need to be part of the BL’s collections in order to properly represent the UK’s audio heritage.

In this presentation I will outline the steps the British Library has taken to deal with the digital domain and how, by working with record labels and industry organisations, the BL has introduced a new methodology to add digital audio releases to the Sound Archive.

Fionnuala Parfrey (Irish Traditional Music Archive) & Michel Merten (Memnon): Developing a New Strategy for Preservation and Access – A Case Study from the Irish Traditional Music Archive

In 2018 the Irish Traditional Music Archive (ITMA) received generous funding from the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht as part of the Digitised Collections Funding Scheme. Thanks to this funding the Digital Audio/visual Preservation (DAP) Project was made possible. Prioritising at-risk non-commercial material, the DAP Project involves digitising over 2,500 audiovisual carriers, including CD-Rs, DATs, DVCAMs and MiniDVs, ingesting the digital assets into a digital preservation system, and making these assets discoverable by the public. This project is the first phase of ITMA’s new strategy for preservation and access, a strategy that involves ongoing digitisation of ITMA collections as well as the development of a new digital preservation system and access platform.

This talk, co-presented by the project archivist at ITMA and the founder of Memnon Archiving Services, will address the lifecycle of the project from the perspective of both the archive and the digitisation service-providers. Memnon will provide insight into the workflows for carrying out mass audiovisual digitisation (in this case 1,500+ hours of audio and 1,200+ hours of video) and secure file delivery, while ITMA will provide insight into various aspects of the project, including the barcoding and packaging of the carriers for digitisation overseas; the development of a QC workflow; the parsing and re-formatting of rich legacy metadata to ISAD(g) descriptive standard; and the ingest of digital audio files into Arkivum’s digital preservation system. The paper will also address the working relationship between both parties and the collaboration and communication at each stage from procurement, through the testing stage, and finally to scale-up and completion.

Dr. Críostóir Mac Cárthaigh, Director, National Folklore Collection, University College Dublin: “Acetate” Disc Recordings in the National Folklore Collection, University College Dublin

The National Folklore Collection at University College Dublin holds a collection of approximately 4,000 acetate disk recordings made by the Irish Folklore Commission in the period 1947-1955. It contains some of the earliest high-quality sound recordings made in Ireland, featuring some 650 hours of speech, song and music from exceptional performers and tradition bearers. The originals are in surprisingly good condition, due largely to the fact that they were seldom played. In the mid-1960s, the disks were dubbed to quarter-inch magnetic tape. In partnership with RTÉ Archives, the NFC is preparing to digitize this valuable collection of recordings, making it available for programme makers and the general public on the NFC’s digital platform at www.duchas.ie.

Malachy Moran, RTE: Connemara Community Radio Digital Archive project

The purpose of the Connemara Community Radio Digital Archive project is to create a pilot digital archive of CCR‘s radio broadcast recordings and associated objects. The pilot archive offers a framework for managing the administrative, technical and human resources needed to maintain the radio station’s broadcast recordings for future access. Since the project started in 2016, a four year sample of radio broadcast recordings has been accessioned and digitised, and day book content for the relevant period has been transcribed. A storage platform has been installed and the existing logging system has been adapted for integration with open source cataloguing and publishing software. Audio and metadata publishing follows a curatorial model, with a greater emphasis on browsing the stations historical collections rather than on the search experience. The project is accompanied by communication programmes to disseminate the project’s learning results to the Irish community radio sector.

Dr. Tomás Mac Conmara, Oral Historian: Oral Tradition and the Irish War of Independence

In the Irish War of Independence (1919-21), much of the fighting was conducted within communities who often knew both the killer and the victim. Where conventional warfare offers the anonymity of distance and impersonality of soldiers, the Irish War of Independence was inherently local. In relatively homogenous, stable communities, traumatic incidents were sometimes dealt with through silence, which in turn became intergenerational. However, in areas where the experience was felt most intimately, much is to be found within that same oral tradition. This presentation explores this reality as understood through a careful assessment of the oral history, tradition and social memory of the period in County Clare, gleaned from over 400 interviews conducted by the author. The presentation will suggest that oral history is critical in order to register and investigate aspects of history which have remained hidden, particularly in relation to an experience that took place a primarily local level. The presentation will involve the use of some samples of recorded audio from the author’s collection.

Tags:

2019

Dublin

BISA 2019 Conference: Call for Papers

webmanager — Thu, 06 Jun 2019 21:59:19 +0000

The annual British & Irish Sound Archives (BISA) conference will take place this year in Dublin from Friday 15th to Saturday 16th November 2019. It will be co-hosted by RTÉ (Raidió Teilifís Éireann) and UCD (University College Dublin) National Folklore Collection.

www.bisa-web.org/bisa-conference-2019

We warmly invite proposals for presentations on any aspect of audio archiving. We particularly welcome proposals addressing issues of common interest, such as caring for sound collections, digitising collections, and long term storage, from private collections to institutional archives. Please send abstracts of no more than 250 words to Robert.Cowlin@bl.uk

Deadline: 26 July 2019

The 2019 BISA conference will be preceded by a training day on Thursday 14th November also held at UCD and RTÉ.

BISA formed in 2006 as a forum to celebrate and share knowledge on the care and promotion of sound collections throughout the British Isles. Our annual conference is a great opportunity for anyone passionate about sound heritage to share skills, enthusiasm, special interests and experience. We hope to see you in Dublin!

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2019

RTÉ

Dublin

BISA Conference 2019

webmanager — Tue, 07 May 2019 09:12:34 +0000

The 2019 BISA Conference will be held in Dublin from 15-16 November 2019 and preceded by a Training Day on Thursday 14th November. It will be co-hosted by RTÉ (Raidió Teilifís Éireann) and UCD (University College Dublin) National Folklore Collection.

The very first BISA meeting was held at RTÉ in 2006; and 2019 will be BISA's third conference in the Republic.

#bisa2019

Abstracts of presentations
Registration
Travel and accommodation advice
Thursday 14th November: Training Day
Friday 15th November: BISA conference, Day 1
Saturday 16th November: BISA conference, Day 2

Thursday 14th November: Training Day -

An optional Training Day in UCD and RTÉ, focussing on cultural podcasting and making documentaries. Maximum capacity: 15 persons per session (limit of one attendee per institution). The Training Day is now fully booked, sorry.

10.15 - 1200 at University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4

Jonny Dillon, Archivist, National Folklore Collection, University College Dublin: Creating a Cultural Podcast

The National Folklore Collection UCD introduced its Blúiríní Béaloidis ('Folklore Fragments') podcast in April 2017, and it has since logged over 85,000 plays. Its creator Jonny Dillon will provide an introductory overview of the practical steps required for the creation of the podcast, guiding attendees through the process from initial research, planning, recording and editing, to final distribution, promotion and evaluation. The presentation will draw on archival sound recordings held at the National Folklore Collection.

1430 - 1700 at RTÉ Radio Centre, Donnybrook, Dublin 4

Speakers TBC: Sound Archives and the art of documentaries

RTÉ Radio's prize-winning documentary team talk about the craft behind radio documentaries; how to use the techniques of storytelling and dramaturgy to make the most compelling listening, e.g. where to begin and where to end a story, what stories succeed, etc. Examples of documentaries that pivot around material obtained from sound archives are examined and critiqued. The training concludes with a Q&A session around the theme of how sound archives can be informed by the art of radio documentary making in the promotion of their services.

Note: we aim to congregate after 6pm in The Cobblestone, at the top of Smithfield Square (map on this page), for evening drinks with traditional music. It's a 15-minute walk from the city centre. A Thursday night in Dublin is always busy, so we recommend that you arrive early!

Radio Centre in RTÉ

Friday 15th November: BISA conference, Day 1

The programme of talks and presentations will run from 0900-1700 hours. The venue is the 100-seat Lecture Theatre at the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin Castle. The address is: The Chester Beatty Library, The Clock Tower Building, Dublin Castle, Dublin 2, D02 AD92.

Chester Beatty Library https://chesterbeatty.ie

Lunch and refreshments will be provided in the Chester Beatty Library's restaurant, the Silk Road Café: www.silkroadkitchen.ie/phone/silk-road-cafe.html

A provisional programme is below.

09.00 Registration, tea + coffee

09.30 Welcome

10.00 Fionnuala Parfrey (Irish Traditional Music Archive) & Michel Merten (Memnon): Developing a New Strategy for Preservation and Access – A Case Study from the Irish Traditional Music Archive

10.40 Andy Linehan (The British Library): Let’s get digital – acquiring commercial releases for the British Library’s Popular Music collection

11.20 Dr. Críostóir Mac Cárthaigh (University College Dublin): Acetate Disc Recordings in the National Folklore Collection, University College Dublin

12.00 Lunch break

13.30 Dr. Tomás Mac Conmara: Oral Tradition and the Irish War of Independence

14.10 Malachy Moran (RTÉ): The Connemara Community Radio Digital Archive project

14.50 Tea + coffee

15.10 Naomi Harvey (National Library of Scotland): Exploring the impact of access to sound archives on traditional song practice in Scotland

15.50 Donal McAnallen (National Museums NI), Katie Scaife (Bristol Culture), David Baldwin (London Metropolitan Archives): Engaging audiences with sound recordings - case studies from Unlocking Our Sound Heritage

16.30 BISA AGM

17.00 Close

After hours: for Friday evening, we have a reserved some places for 5.30pm in a nice French restaurant close to the Chester Beatty called Chez Max Palace Place (see map of BISA 2019 venues). Other options will be announced during the meeting.

Saturday 16th November: BISA conference, Day 2

Visits to the Irish Traditional Music Archive and the Contemporary Music Centre.

1000 - 1100 The Contemporary Music Centre, Fishamble Street, Dublin 1.

The Contemporary Music Centre (CMC) is Ireland's archive and resource centre for new music, supporting the work of composers throughout the Republic and Northern Ireland. (maximum 50 places)

1130 - 1230 Irish Traditional Music Archive, 73 Merrion Square, Dublin 2

ITMA’s aims are to collect all the materials of Irish traditional music and to make a representative collection of the traditional music of other countries; to preserve these materials indefinitely for present use and for future generations; to organise the information and materials held by the Archive; and to make the materials and information held as widely available as possible to the general public, consistent with the preservation of material and within the limitations of copyright law and Archive resources. (maximum 24 places)

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BISA 2019 to be held in Dublin

webmanager — Thu, 29 Nov 2018 17:54:22 +0000

We are delighted to announce that RTÉ (Raidió Teilifís Éireann) and UCD (University College Dublin) National Folklore Collection will host the next BISA meeting in Dublin, Ireland, from Friday 15th to Saturday 16th November.

More information

The very first BISA meeting was held at RTÉ in 2006; and 2019 will be BISA's third conference in the Republic.

The venue for Friday 15th November from 0900-1700 hours is the 100-seat Lecture Theatre at the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin Castle. We will additionally arrange a training day on Thursday 14th November.

Please mark the dates in your diaries!

More information will be circulated early in 2019.

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2019

RTÉ

Dublin

BISA 2014 AGM Minutes

Jonathan Draper — Thu, 04 Jun 2015 11:34:38 +0000

Minutes of British & Irish Sound Archives (BISA) Annual General Meeting held on 16 May 2014, at Fiontar, Dublin City University, Glasnevin, Dublin 9, Republic of Ireland

1. To Receive Minutes of Previous Annual General Meeting held on 17 May 2013 at the Manx Museum, Kingswood Grove, Douglas, Isle of Man, IM1 3LY

The minutes were accepted as a true record. Simon Rooks (SR) duly signed the minutes.

2. Committee Members’ Reports

Convenor - Simon Rooks (SR) thanked Fiontar for hosting this year’s event, BISA’s eleventh, which he described as a good day. SR hoped that it had met Fiontar’s needs. SR explained that Brian Rice (BR) was standing down from the BISA committee after seven years. He thanked BR for all his hard work for BISA. SR explained that as a result of BR stepping down from the committee, that there was now a vacancy and invited volunteers to come forward. Post AGM note: Grace Toland of the Irish Traditional Music Archive volunteered to join the BISA committee. This was unanimously agreed by the committee.

Secretary - Jonathan Draper (JD) explained that prior to the event in Dublin, BISA had 105 members.

Treasurer - Dafydd Pritchard (DP) stated that there was £1,870.00 in BISA’s bank account prior to this year’s annual event. This was a drop of £999.59 compared to the same time in 2013. This was a consequence of high expenses incurred by the location of BISA’s 2013 event on the Isle of Man.

Webmaster - Richard Ranft (RR) encouraged members to add content to BISA website. There was some discussion about adding presentations. BR agreed to liaise with the speakers at this year’s event. It was noted that BISA didn’t include sound recordings of the presentations on the website.

Listowner - Will Prentice (WP) reported that there were 165 members of BISA’s JISCmail discussion list. WP invited delegates and BISA members in general to write e-mails to the discussion list.

3. BISA Directory

SR promoted the directory and encouraged people to add their details. He suggested that the area covered by BISA should be divided into regions, which could then be assigned to BISA’s committee members so they could encourage sound archive repositories in that region to add their details to the directory. There was a discussion prompted by Alistair Bell of the National Library of Scotland about the relationship between BISA members and entries on the directory. SR, JD and others suggested that the two should be synonymous. RR explained that it was possible for those who applied for login details to the directory could automatically acquire membership. JD mentioned that as directory entries would be completed by Full Institutional members of BISA some mechanism would be required for the three others types of membership. There was also some discussion, prompted by DP, about commercial members. He explained IASA’s approach to sponsorship. It was decided to not pursue this at the present time and that the focus should be on holders of publicly accessible sound archive collections.

4. Any Other Items of Business

There were no other items of business.

5. Date and Time of Next BISA Conference

SR explained that there had been one offer of a venue, but invited other offers. No date was set for BISA’s 2015 event. SR mentioned that the BISA committee placed great importance on visiting various parts of the region covered by BISA and noted that each event tended to attract delegates from that area who had not been to a previous BISA event.

The meeting ended at 17:35.

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BISA Conference 2014

webmanager — Tue, 27 Jan 2015 16:57:08 +0000

Event: British and Irish Sound Archives’ Annual Conference

Venue: Fiontar, DCU, Glasnevin, Dublin 9

Dates: 16 and 17 May 2014

Friday, 16 May 2014

09:30 - Registration and refreshments.

10:20 - Welcome from Simon Rooks, BISA convenor and Dr. Ciarán Mac Murchaidh, Head of School, Fiontar.

10:40 - Continuing to build a digital repository for Ireland. Dr. Natalie Harrower, Manager of Education and Outreach, Digital Repository of Ireland. Followed by Q&A session.

11:20 - The work of the Irish Traditional Music Archive. Grace Toland, Librarian, Irish Traditional Music Archive.Followed by Q&A session.

12:00 - Europeana Creative: Sound Archives and Social Networks. Lizzy Komen, Project Manager R&D, Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision and Tom Miles, Project Manager, British Library. Followed by Q&A session.

12:40 - Lunch (provided courtesy of Fiontar).

14:00 - Proinsias Ó Conluain : A broadcasting legacy. Ian Lee, producer RTÉ radio and Liam Wylie, RTÉ archives.Followed by Q&A session.

14:40 - Linking Europe's digital sound archives. Richard Ranft, Head of Sound and Vision, British Library.Followed by Q&A session.

15:20 - Refreshments

15:40 - Producing pronunciation guides for Irish toponyms on logainm.ie. Dr. Brian Ó Raghallaigh, Lecturer & Research Project Technical Manager, Fiontar, Dublin City University. Followed by Q&A session.

16.30 - Launch of the new version of the national placenames database, logainm.ie, and of the new Ordnance Survey Ireland (OSi) Irish-language Web mapping service, MapGenie Éire.

17:15 - AGM

17.45 - Close

Saturday, 17 May 2014

09:30 - Workshop: Publishing and promoting archives on the internet.

11:00 - Close.

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